Dolls

I was 33 when I acquired my first house. It was built in the 1950’s and in a 1930’s Art Deco style. It had three bedrooms, a bathroom, a drawing room, dining room and a small kitchen.

Ready furnished with period pieces, all it needed was redecorating and a little refurbishing. It went on to become a traditional family home, complete with dad, mum and three children.

It was three feet high and two feet wide and I was only allowed (at last) to play with a dolls house because we had just had a baby girl and we were getting it ready for her. 

I have always loved small and miniature things; books, dolls, furniture, everything small scale. Being a boy, I never had the opportunity to ‘play’ with such things. I didn’t even have a sister, whose dolls I could have played with. Also, I was brought up in a very rough part of Liverpool and it wasn’t something to mention out loud. 

But now, I had a daughter and she was going to like dolls and dolls houses. We were given this first one as it was a family piece (made by my wife’s grandfather for his daughter). I got it ready and bought another two, all complete with miniature interiors and dolls to inhabit them. 

As soon as my daughter could play, we would sit and play for hours with these houses. We would make up stories and imagine what the dolls were saying to each other, what they were doing in the kitchen and in the drawing room. 

We would buy extra furniture and even more dolls as friends and neighbours. 

It developed into a garden, with sunbathing dolls and plants and animals. We had a gardener, cook and butler. A house with staff!

 

My daughter developed a great imagination and her stories were so much more vivid than mine. She is now twenty- three and still loves all things miniature and her/my dolls houses live with us as she doesn’t yet have her own place. She reckons dolls hold in secrets and as I pass them on the landing each day, I smile because they know all mine. 
 

 

The art of  small things


As the doll turns the page,
don't offend the book, or its age
by saying it could be opened faster
if it were bigger, vaster

than the whole library he’s sitting with.
This is all part of the myth
that bigger is better – or another,
that life is ruled by Big Brother

watching you. Mass media’s laced
with this hype and it can be traced
back to ‘size matters’ – it’s implicit
you don’t have to listen for it.

 A strong magnifying- glass
will show the miniature’s class.
When you fix it in your view,
the truth that hides becomes visible to you.




Thanks for reading,
David Wilkinson

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I'm Kinder After Fruit

The below will be split into three sections, you are most welcome to read just one or perhaps none.

 

Musings
If carrots make you see in the dark, does the kiwi have the equal potential to be as exquisite? 

Recently I used a kitchen tool that de-cores an apple whilst simultaneously cutting it into 6

identical sized pieces. It was the most excessive and significant moment of my day. Extremely unnecessary. I ate each satisfying segment before bed.
 
Once there was a boy with an apple head. A big juicy apple head. Core n all.

 Banana holders aren’t necessary objects.

A banana coffin created to keep it alive before it is killed.
Primary protection.

I quietly question the use.

Sometimes after a big greasy curry I want to slop and complain.

I wonder if I ate fruit all the time, would I be a better person? - say kinder.

Kind-er. Kind-er-er. Kinderrrrrr.

Things would be less, all the less / lessons.

Task
A banana provides a slow release source of energy.
It contains a superior source of carbohydrates, potassium and vitamin B6, which in turn can help boost our energy levels.

I wonder if I strategically ate bananas throughout the day, at regular intervals, would I always have energy?

I try this for one day. 

03:00 - I set an alarm, wake up and have 1 banana

05:00 - I set an alarm, wake up and feel sick so don’t eat 1 banana

10:00 - 1 banana

13:00 - 1 banana

16:30 - 1 banana

18:15 - 1 banana

20:00 - 1/2 a banana

22:15 - 1/2 a banana

If my body devours a high quantity of fruit everyday, I imagine I would have unlimited energy. Extra assertive. Fruit fuel.

There’s no scientific evidence indicating this task will have the predicted correlation but it’s still something I want to pursue. A friend told me that the potassium intake of eating 40 consecutive bananas could kill you, so I just ate six.

Fruit fuel. I may write six arts applications, smash a 10 hour work shift, maintain my social

commitments effortlessly and still feel revitalised the next day.

It might be like drugs. Healthier drugs.

Is the banana a drug? Dunno.

Maybe I would make more time to support people, put extra thought into birthday presents, maybe I could stop procrastinating and claiming it was because I was ‘tired’ and ‘needed my body to catch up with itself’.

How far in front is my body?

If it is always a step ahead then that explains why sometimes my brain is behind, forgetting names of people and places like sieve water.

If my body linked perfectly with my body would that work better?

Catching up is difficult but it can be done.What if my body held my body really close so it never escaped itself, so it would work in tandem always?

I imagine the whole world eating bananas strategically. We all wake up at 3am and 5am to chow down so we aren’t tired later. When we kissed would it be for ages because we had more breath.

Everyone’s walk would be bouncy and people would frequently skip.

End

The banana is bruised - wounded.

I hold it on the bus like a fallen bird.

Martha Pailing, 2018

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The Romantics

These two words conjure an image in my mind of running through fields with flowers in my hand and my beloved running after me, very much like the Bollywood films we see. In truth, I also remember the American rock band The Romantics, although they were formed way before my time. I must have been five or six when I used to hear 'What I Like About You' playing in the family room.

But that's not the romantics I am interested in. It might possibly be because I am not too open to the lofty notion of romance when it involves another; as space filled with ego and devoid of true compassion and respect, a transactional seat which requires rules and thoughts to meet the needs of another.

I am much more drawn to the romantics who see the beauty and harshness of our existence and can lay them out with such care and sensibility, the right measure of words, imagery and more than enough space for my thoughts to marinate. It is a fine dining of consciousness.

painting by Kahlil Gibran

Such pieces include Kahlil Gibran's 'The Forerunner'. Oh my! Each time O read it, I have a different thought, connection and interpretation. Or Hermann Hesse's 'Siddhartha'. What a journey of discovery and so poetic in its writing. Or 'The Bluest Eyes' by Toni Morrison. Some pages require rereading to comprehend what the writer is telling you, even though you understood the first time!

I begin to realise that the romantics are truly living, dissecting the myriad of actions, thoughts and emotions - our very existence!

These are only a few of the romantics in my life, and as I meander around the fields with flowers in my hand each plucked from the roots of life I gather as another lesson of self-discovery, I am filled with love and gratitude for the romantics in my life.

The Romantics of Higher Consciousness
Lay with me beneath the stars
Dance to the music in your heart
Be ready to peel to your core
Your skin adorns you, so pure
Drink from the cup of life
Commune with your tribe
Let's dine as intended
The romantics in you and I.

Hodan Noor

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Mask

I love masks, as strange as that may sound. I love their warped features and empty stares. I have two Venetian masks hanging on my bedroom wall - to me they are beautiful. As a theatre student and performer I really appreciate how wearing a mask can really transform you.  They not only make you look different but they make you feel different. To me It feels like another part of myself that has been locked away in the depths of my unconscious, has surfaced and is ready to prowl.

Mask work can help people to see the world from a different perspective and to grow in confidence. Trestle Theatre Company works with people of all walks of life; the elderly, children, depressives and even criminals to help them grow as individuals. All through the power of mask!

Now, how are masks relevant in the real world I hear you ask? I believe we all kind of wear masks - metaphorically speaking unless you’re in to that kind of thing! I believe we change who we are to suit our environment. We put on different faces so to speak.  The tricky thing is when we have to make the decision on how drastically do we need to change ourselves to fit in.  Stay true to you and follow your gut is my advice, if you have to put on a mask to please those around you… you’re not surrounding yourself with the right people.

A poem by moi!

A Room Full of Faces

I look everywhere

Around

Up

Down.

I see a sea of masks.

Each one concealing a hidden desire.

With all this fakery,

I want truth

I want fire.

You and I are stuck in a room full of faces.

Let’s leave,

Let’s explore new places.

Thanks for reading, Helena x

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Books

I'm one of those people who gets trapped in their own mind, caged by obsession and daydreams. A book is a source of escape. Images flash across my mind like a vivid movie and sometimes it's as though I'm inside that movie, an extra observing the leads from a distance.

Truthfully until the last month I've been distant from my beloved books, busy with the demands of life. But since picking up a book again my soul feels soothed.

In an odd way, being lost in a book has helped me to find myself.

I don't believe that people don't like books. I just believe that they haven't found one that connects with them yet. Books are good for you. Who cares about vegetables?

A poem by me!

 

 
 
The Love Of My Life
Let's get lost together.
As I hold you in my hands
And breathe in your warm worn smell 
You cast a spell,
Over me
With your delicious words.
With you I don't feel so absurd!
You make me laugh and cry.
Don't die.
Don't lie there,
Withering away.
I didn't mean to drop you.
Please stay.
I know I only have a short loan
But don't leave me alone,
Let's have one more journey together!
Hey the library won't notice
If you stay with me forever.


Thanks for reading, Helena x

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Sailing

I am a sailor. I am.  At least I was. I still sail, just differently.

A proper grown up now, conscious of everything that I do.

A proper bore often. Sailing through the life for now.

But I have to tell you about a real sailing, I can’t help it but tell the story.

 

I was growing up in a place and at the time where there wasn’t any child protection, risk assessments, health and safety. Families were looking after children who were free and happy. We learned early to assess situations, developed common sense and discovered the 'cause and effect' rule. We climbed trees and fences, we spotted and seized opportunities to try new adventures, big and small, to be honest, mostly small, at least till teenage years.

 

Back to the sailing.  I used to spend a big part of summers at auntie Liz’s house. It was in the middle of nowhere, surrounded by meadows, woodlands and, just wait, it was near a quite large and rapid salmon river, as we called it. My grandma as a full time grandma, looked after me, my brother and my two cousins. I was the oldest. Grandma used to say, when looking after children you can’t take your eye of them, and she didn’t. We were considered good children, we were, and grandma had hands full of different jobs, to keep us fed, clean and our mess under control.

 

I was always fascinated by water, an Aquarius, who didn’t believe in horoscopes. But you never know.  So once when grandma took her eye off us, doing one of her many chores, I had a brilliant idea and I managed to take an instant action. I took my team of sailors down to the river, packed into an old 'seen better days' wooden boat, untied it and pushed off the river bank straight into the stream.

 

 

The boat was the kind of one you move and manoeuvre with a long pole, pushing with it from the river bottom.  I was nine, my brother two, my cousins three and five. The pushing pole, or whatever it was called, was a bit too long and heavy for me, but it didn’t matter, the enjoyment of actually sailing was breath-taking, we all were excited and scared. Grandma spotted us nearly straight away, but it was too late already, by that time, the boat was in the stream, being carried down the river towards the Baltic sea. To be honest, the sea was not that close at all.

 

I can’t remember panicking, I was focusing to keep the boat moving my way, not stream’s way. At that point grandma was running on the river bank shouting: “Push the boat to me, push the boat to me!” I did my best but, as I said, the pole was very heavy and a little bit of water started to come into the boat through the holes, a little bit more than just a little bit. Anyway, I kept calm and focused.

 

I think I did extremely well, because in a couple of hundred metres I  managed to get my ship to the shore. Grandma and all of us were so excited about such a successful mooring, she even did not screamed or yelled or punished us, she never did anyway, she seemed just absolutely happy about the outcome of this little sailing adventure.

 

Then the old boat was cut into pieces and used for a bonfire. We enjoyed it as much as the sailing, even we felt a bit sad about our vehicle.  At the end of the day it was my first and last proper little ship.

 

Later, I found out that grandma’s dad was a sailor who drowned in the Baltic sea when she was just a little girl, leaving her mum on her own with nine children.

 

Grandma passed away at age of eighty eight with heart arrhythmia, no wonder, knowing how her life was, before the grandchildren and then doing years long service, looking after four sailors, musketeers, explorers and unruly teenagers later, full time.

 

She sailed through her life extremely well, I know it now. I always look up to her, I know I can do it, whatever happens, I can sail through my life extremely well too.

 

Thank you for reading, Maya Anna Ozolina

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Theatre Is Life

Theatre is life… Theatre is my life, my reason to get up in the morning. Performing consumes my thoughts daily, like the comedic panto character who constantly bumbles around the stage disrupting the ‘serious’ characters to interject a ridiculous joke.

The Theatre/performing allows me to experience another life, a different reality. I believe watching a show helps people to gain understanding of others and come to terms with their own issues.  The Theatre is live, allowing everyone to live in the moment rather than pressing record and watching it later… In a world that is constantly evolving and changing it’s refreshing to sit back, relax and just take in what’s happening in front of you.

So if you are fed up of the constant bombarding of emails, annoying Snapchats from the Ex or just generally need to recharge your batteries… book yourself a ticket for a show and turn off your phone.  Trust me, it’s a lot cheaper than an exotic holiday!

The Stage
When I'm on stage...
I feel alive.
I feel I can fly.
I feel wild and free,
As the adrenaline pumps through me.
I show another perspective.
I live another life.
So you have the ability to change yours!
I don't do it for the fame...
We just need to recognise underneath our skin
We are all the same.

Thanks for reading, Helena x

 

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Winter Ghosts

Ghosts in horror films are seen as scary, horrifying, supernatural beings… When really I think they are lost souls searching for a purpose.

 

I’m not sure if anyone else feels how I feel but during the winter months I feel haunted by my past. Not like Scrooge haunted by the three ghosts, but I think about the year that’s past… The highs and the lows. The wonderful new people I have met and those I have left behind.

 

The key thing is not to continue letting those ‘Winter Ghosts’ corrupt your thoughts. Think positively, act positively and you will be so happy and fulfilled that you won’t have time for the ghouls in your mind. At the end of the year spend time with your love ones… Don’t be a ghost....

 

 

Daylight

I spend my nights searching…

Days dreaming…

Life wishing….

Mind re-playing…

Daylight disappears…

Leaving me alone with all my fears…

Of all those wasted years…

 

Helena Ascough - Thanks for reading.

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